


the 1

by unicornsarescary



Series: my mind turns your life into folklore [1]
Category: The Haunting of Bly Manor (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, F/F, its not happy i wont lie, major character death but its canonical
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:28:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28208334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unicornsarescary/pseuds/unicornsarescary
Summary: i thought i saw you at the bus stop i didn’t though - the 1 by taylor swift'dani spent so much time running from faces, now jamie is running towards one.'essentially the start of folklore prompts series for dani & jamie.
Relationships: Dani Clayton/Jamie
Series: my mind turns your life into folklore [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2074812
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	the 1

**Author's Note:**

> me: i hate angst  
> also me: how can i hurt them
> 
> mostly canon but i fuck with post-danis death a bit 
> 
> also im posting this at a weird time and don't feel like editing so if there r mistakes just ignore them for now :)

Dani hadn’t been able to look in a reflective surface with confidence for years, constantly in fear of her nightmares leaking into reality. So she used Jamie as her mirror, allowing herself to drown in the swirling browns that brought nothing but comfort. It was Jamie’s eyes that told her the end was coming when she could no longer see herself in them, but her very own grim reaper. 

Nightmares were consistent for months, horrifying, however, no matter how much she tried to fight off sleep to avoid them, Jamie’s body wrapped in hers always lolled her to sleep. She was okay with this routine, while it was so incredibly far from perfect it still had her and Jamie together, which at the end of the day was all she needed. 

But then it was Jamie in danger. Then it was no longer placing danger solely on herself. So she left. Knowing that nothing could happen to Jamie, she left. She attempted to scrawl all of her feelings onto the paper, how Jamie felt and smelled like home. How she single-handedly made Dani love herself. How her endless teasing made Dani bubble. How her smiles were infectious, and their very presence on Jamie’s face was enough to fill Dani with happiness. How her lips were the best thing Dani had ever tasted. How even though she spewed pessimism, she was a blatant optimist in private. How she was the only person to properly love Dani. How she was Dani’s everything. 

Dani’s body returned to Bly, but her mind didn't leave Jamie for a moment. 

Jamie woke up knowing something was different, but she fooled herself for a bit. Fooling herself into thinking Dani was off in the kitchen ruining an innocent cup of tea. But as she got out of bed she was forced to face the music. 

She cried at seeing the letter. 

She cried while reading the letter. 

She couldn’t stop crying. 

She called Owen and simply cried. 

She laid on Dani’s side of the bed and cried. 

After two days of being unable to function, Owen came. 

A godsend really, Jamie could not have gone on any longer without anyone there. 

And time passed, and Jamie’s sadness became a lingering part of her life, so she accepted it. And she held it because when there was sadness, there was the reminder that Dani had been there. After two weeks Owen left, or more realistically Jamie forced him to leave promising she’d be alright on her own. And she was, for the most part, she and Owen called, she ate, she tended to the flowers, and while she wasn’t happy, she was alright. 

She decided to make the return to Bly a month after Dani’s passing, not expecting it to be easy, but the magnetic pull she felt upon arriving at the lake could not have been predicted. And in an attempt to satisfy the feeling, she swam down. That was when she stopped thinking rationally, and she just screamed. 

Wanting nothing more than to run her fingers along the delicate features that would only fade with time. She would’ve given anything to lose herself in Dani one more time, to take in every last piece of her. Dani’s body laid perfectly still, save for the light movement of the lake rocking her. But with purely her will, she pushed Jamie out of the waters back into safety. At that moment they felt each other again, briefly, and for what both hoped would not be the last time. 

Neither woman could explain the phenomenon, but it restored a hope to them that was previously lost. For Jamie, it cemented Dani’s presence in her life, and that if she looked hard enough, one day she would be there. 

Thus began Jamie’s new routine of checking each mirror for Dani, then the bath, then leaving the door just a touch open for her. Dani, of course, watched her perform this routine every night and while she wished for Jamie to continue with her life, she couldn’t help but be touched by her wife’s actions. 

And with time the days began melting for Jamie, blurring together into one big mess of time. Opening the shop, closing the shop, making bouquets, helping customers, it all fell together. The only time she was pulled out of her course was her weekly phone call with Owen. He had made her promise to call, and she had agreed secretly excited for their meetings. 

Things with Owen felt simple, their chattering wasn’t usually meaningful just something to stay connected. They swapped customer stories and Owen made the worst puns she’d ever heard, which only seemed to get worse with practice.  
About four months after Jamie had revisited Bly she started seeing Dani, just for a moment never lingering. No matter how much Jamie wished she would. 

It was just in the corner of her eye when she turned too quickly, or when she entered a room too quickly. She recognized it as Dani the first time she saw her, the blonde hair and blue eyes that were etched into her brain only showing for a second. This of course was more than enough time for Jamie to identify the woman as her wife. 

It didn’t take long before Jamie began to chase these moments, she would practically turn her head 360 degrees just in the hopes of getting a glimpse of Dani. And she begged every night to see Dani’s reflection in the mirror instead of her own. She wanted to lose herself in the pair of too blue eyes, the ones that belonged only to Dani. Not the mixed pair that only reminded her of what was lost, but the stunning sky blue pair that brought only hope. 

And the chasing didn’t stop, and Jamie didn’t want it to. She was going numb and she knew it, detaching from her emotions seemed healthy to her at the beginning of her mourning however she would give anything to be able to cry over Dani again. In the moments when she saw the blonde in her peripheral vision, she felt herself falling over and over. Nothing felt better to her than that. 

So Jamie continued to chase that ghostly face that haunted her in the best way imaginable. She lived out her life finding comfort in its presence. And when she felt her time coming, she made a final trip to Bly Manor where she spent her remaining days. Until finally she was reunited with the face that had spent so long in corners and just out of reach.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks so much for reading!! comments and kudos are always appreciated :)
> 
> also!! if you have any folklore themed prompts please lmk!! i'm gonna be making this a series so if there's anything you wanna see i'll do my best to include it :)
> 
> playlist i wrote to: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6e1uaVpRuNKTamv5bJZU6c?si=KNkdgYe0TLSRIiZ8Fs1HHw


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